Here’s Why Holding Elections In Pakistan in 2018 May Not Be Possible

P akistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) has indicated that General Elections in Pakistan for the national and provincial assemblies scheduled to be held next year might get delayed, and may not take place as per the schedule.While quoting the reason, one of the PBS sources stated: “The final results of the Census 2017 will be available in April 2018” Interestingly, it was only last week that the PBS had recommended to the Council of Common Interests (CCI) to make constitutional amendment to hold next general elec- tions on the basis of fresh census data. Federal Minister for Statistics Kamran Michael, had been reported in media to have said in a press conference: “We have recommended to the CCI in the last meeting to make constitutional amendment to replace the word ‘final’ with ‘provisional’ results to hold next general elections on the basis of 6th population census.” Elections and census result are co-related Additionally, he also stated that elections in Pakistan are supposed to take place after tak- ing into account the population in accordance with the latest census result. He further went on to say that even if the final results are declared in April 2018, then ECP will be unable to conduct election next year as per the constitutional requirement. CCI has already given a deadline to PBS to publish the census results as soon as they could by December 2017. The idea behind the deadline is to smoothly conduct elections in Pakistan as per the schedule.